The future in Salou's quality of life depends on its commercial and service sector

Salou. Costa Dorada. The Trade Center of Salou, within its work area of Knowledge Management, has brought to light the first commercial socio-economic tissue report of the municipality. On this occasion, the Center has submitted a synthetic indicator of trade in Salou, which collects the most relevant data in a single descriptive value. "This report lets us know where we are, so we can make better decisions in the right direction," says Peter Lavilla, Councilor of Commerce and Consumer Markets. For the PP councilor, "This first report shows us something we already knew: that trade has a transcendent weight in our town, and that good or bad development of this means the future of Salou. "What is clear," continues Lavilla, is that a stage is over where we were marking the traders with our offer to move to a stage where the rhythm is marked by the demand. "According to the minister of commerce, in the worst case scenario, it may happen that we run out of necessary and optimal demand. So now it's time to reinvent ourselves".   The commercial and service sector represents the industry on the basis that underpins the economy of Salou, in employment and in gross value added. In this sense, if already in 2001, in the boom of construction, commercial and service sector accounted for 86% of gross value added of the municipality, we can calmly say that, today, with the brick in crisis , we can extrapolate the weight percentage equal to or greater than 90%. The commercial and service sector based business in the foreign consumer, loyalty as only just over 10% of the indigenous population and is virtually a no ability to attract potential consumers of the neighboring areas (0, 6%). This means that the commercial and service sector of Salou has a highly seasonal profile, focusing on the tip tourists offer in the summer months, which, so far, doubles the average annual floating population. The origin of foreign tourists, mostly British, reveals a sociological profile of potential consumers looking for an economic and commercial supply of low quality. This is evident in the commercial offer of Salou on the top three places are bars, pubs and restaurants, followed in second place for the generalist outlets souvenir items. Next to a commercial supply of low value added, too dependent on a medium / medium-low tourism, we must add the sociological reality of our own town of Salou in which 42% of the population census (and not real) is of immigrant origin, with the mainstream from the Senegalese community, followed at a distance of Romanian, British and Moroccan. A segment of the population, the immigrant, which develops its activity mainly in the commercial and service sector. A social factor that we must add is the low level of education of the indigenous population, with a rate of 10% of citizens with no education and 13% short segment of the population with university education. The current economic and social indicators of Salou has a commercial and service sector, on the one hand, the key to economic development in the municipality, but on the other hand and in turn, with high potential risks in the short to medium term due to its many weaknesses: a reliance on seasonal foreign consumers being very vulnerable in periods of economic recession, a commercial offer with no added value and a low level of qualification in the sector.

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